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Welcome to After Silence - A message board and chat room for rape, sexual assault, and sexual abuse survivors.

Welcome to After Silence, a message board and chat room designed to help survivors communicate in the recovery of rape, sexual abuse, sexual assault, and all types of sexual violence.

After Silence has over 30 different forums, ranging from topics created to discuss specific areas of healing and recovery from rape and sexual violence, as well as forums open to general discussions and lighter topics. Because we value the privacy of our members, most of our forums are private, which means that ONLY REGISTERED members have access to them. Please register for a free account to gain full access to the After Silence Online Support Group.

A Place Of Honesty?

So, I'm generally a closed off person. Even with my best friends and family, I keep an arms length from them when it comes to honesty about moods and intimacy and anything remotely related to..you know. You know?

The tipping point was a few days ago when I found myself outwardly laughing (inwardly cringing and outraged) at my best friend's rape joke, just because I felt like fitting in with everyone else who was laughing. So that sucked and I realized I never wanted to talk about such topics with my friends ever, and that sucked too.

Now I'm here..hoping to be honest with strangers instead, and hoping to..I guess..get things sorted out mentally and emotionally.

Welcome to After Silence. I can relate to what you said about keeping what happened private. I did for a very long time too. Talking to other survivors through this site helped in so many ways because they understood that abuse and its effects on life aren't a joke.

I'm proud of you for reaching out for help as you journey down the path to recovery. Be gentle and patient with yourself, and I'm sure you will begin to get things sorted out within your soul!

If you have questions about the forums or need assistance in anyway, please send me a message, and I will gladly do what I can to assist..

Thank you, I'm glad to know that what I'm starting on this site now has helped someone else. Also, you're officially the first person to respond warmly and kindly to me even referencing this. I don't even know you, but it made me sort of emotional haha.

So thank you for that, your good advice, and your offers of assistance.

Welcome Claire! Your post echoed much of my own situation. I've been here about 18 months, and through talking here and starting to understand myself better I have finally opened up to a few close friends. Not that you have to do that if you don't want to. I have had so much support here, I hope you find the same. Take care!

Thank you Dastigerlily, I'm exceedingly happy that you found something to connect with in my post. I wish you all the luck in the world on these forums and I hope we both find a comfortable in the outside world as well, haha. And thank you, Janepp, as well. Take care!

I know how you feel, it took a while for me to get to this point as I generally shut everyone out. Indeed to this day, only 3 people (not including the guy who abused me) know what happened; and was only cos I had nightmares and was shouting out in my sleep while with them